


I Will Break Down the Gates to Hell

by AlexKingOfTheDamned, swimsalot



Category: The Avengers - Ambiguous Fandom
Genre: Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, Forced Childbirth, M/M, Mpreg, Omegaverse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-05-06
Updated: 2013-05-06
Packaged: 2017-12-10 13:56:45
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 3
Words: 10,702
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/786799
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AlexKingOfTheDamned/pseuds/AlexKingOfTheDamned, https://archiveofourown.org/users/swimsalot/pseuds/swimsalot
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Eight and a half months pregnant, Clint was supposed to have backup on that mission, but Fury had other plans. A few days and one stolen baby later, and Phil is on his own mission to bring his baby home at any cost.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Sort of has mpreg in it. Clint is never pregant in the fic, but he was. It's omegaverse so it's biologically possible for him to be pregnant, but if that squicks you out then go look for something else to read c:

Clint knows as soon as he wakes up that something is wrong. Well he knew when he fell unconscious something was wrong. The plan wasn't meant to go like this. Pregnant omegas have been going missing and he agreed to let SHIELD use him as bait. He's the perfect match for what the kidnappers have been looking for. Right at the end of his pregnancy and happily awaiting the birth of his son or daughter. They were supposed to make sure he was covered and no one actually got to him. Anyone who made a move should have been taken out long before they reached him. Yet here he is, lying on an old thin cot and feeling just all over wrong.  
  
For one, he can't feel his baby kicking. He can't feel it moving at all or even the reassuring weight of it and that immediately sends him into a panic. He looks down at the now familiar sight of his bulbous stomach and wants to throw up. An ugly red cut, stitched up with thick black thread runs in a line down his somewhat flattened torso where his baby should be. Someone cut him open and took away his baby.  
  
He tastes bile and turns over to puke off the edge of the cot. He has to find his child. He can't leave here without him/her. He just can't. Phil will kill him.  
  
He tries to stand and falls over, landing on his face and nearly screaming in pain. He's off balance, vision going hazy. Drugged. Weak and in pain and drugged. He can't stand but that doesn't stop him from crawling to the door and using the handle to pull himself upright. He's a trained agent. He can fight through the drug if he just tries hard enough.

 

As he's pulling himself up, he sees dark red smears on his wrists. With a start, he falls back down to the ground and inspects his wrists. They've both been messily slit. With panic, he shreds the bottom of the filthy once-white trousers he's wearing and ties the strips around his wrists as tightly as he can without cutting off the circulation. Whoever cut his wrists clearly didn't know what they were doing.

 

Pulling himself more successfully upright this time, Clint pulls the heavy metal door open with an ear-splitting screech. He freezes, but he hears no footsteps or shouts or anything at all, other than the sound of his own breathing. He peers into the hall and sees nothing in either direction. The building he’s in looks like some kind of abandoned mental facility, with discarded and rusting gurneys and old-fashioned wheelchairs sit around in various state of disrepair, collecting cobwebs.

 

Directly across the hall from him is an open doorway, door hanging off its hinges inside the room, and there are four gurneys lining the wall with people on them. He stumbles into the room and tries to shake awake the four omegas, each with matching cuts stitched up their bellies. But their lips are pale and their bodies are cold, and their wrists are slit to the bone. Every one of them, dead. He wonders if his wrists weren’t cut as deep on purpose, if they planned on coming back later and finishing the job, or if they were in a rush.

 

He leaves the dead omegas and keeps stumbling down the hall, always making sure there's a hiding spot nearby in case someone comes to get him. He needs to find a way out. He needs to find his baby and get the hell out of here to call Phil. Then he can send someone back to clean out the facility and take care of the bodies. Right now he can't afford to waste time thinking about them.

 

As he wanders through the endless dilapidated halls of the ancient hospital, he realizes that he is completely alone. There’s not eve the squeak of a rat as he slips through the hallways as soundlessly as he can while grieving and delirious and drugged. The windows are all broken or empty of glass completely, but heavy steel bars keep Clint from climbing out and making his way to the ground. For the best, he decides, seeing as he’s four stories up and drugged.

 

He listens closely for the sounds of babies crying, but he hears nothing even as he creeps down a flight of stone steps to the floor below.

 

He keeps going, carefully checking every room he can find. But there's nothing. No captors, no babies, no one but the rats and flies. He was simply left here to die and while his child was stolen and taken off to god knows where.

 

When he finally reaches the lowest floor, he finds the front doors chained shut from the outside. Not a huge problem, seeing as the lowest floor windows aren’t barred. There is wire criss-crossing through the glass, but he can deal with a few minor cuts. He hurls a wheel chair through the class and wriggles through the broken wires. His feet are cut in a couple places as he finds himself on the wooden porch of the ancient facility.

 

He hurries forward and turns around to look at the building, and realizes that it’s some kind of plantation mansion that had been renovated into a mental ward. There was a sign out front, but he couldn’t begin to care. He can see a chain link fence off in the distance that circles the old house completely, with barbed wire heaped on top. But now that he’s not pregnant anymore, he can move as swiftly and agilely as before (minus the fact he’s drugged.)

 

He rips off more of his pants to wrap around his hands before climbing up the fence. He slips and falls a few times but doesn't let that stop him. He reaches the top and lifts the wire, the barbs barely cutting him through the layers of clothe, and slides under it to climb back down.  
  
From there he starts looking for a road. There has to be one to get him here and hopefully he'll be able to hitch a ride or walk to a gas station. But he's growing tired and dizzy, the mix of blood loss and the drug getting to him. He'll need to move quickly if he's going to get anywhere before he passes out.

 

 

 

 

He walks for two days.

 

 

 

There is nothing to be found but a giant plain. He walks through the first night, but the second night he takes shelter beneath a bush and sleeps for a few hours. He’s feeling weaker by the hour, and he starts to think all hope is lost when he sees the shiny black ribbon of a highway winding in the distance.

 

It only takes him a few hours more to stumble to the side of the road, and he’s picked up almost instantly by a very anxious-looking middle aged woman.

 

“What happened to you, dear?” she asks as she helps Clint lie across the back seat of her car. It’s leather, and cool against his sunburnt back.

 

"I need a phone." Clint murmurs. "Please, someone took my baby, I need a phone. I need to call for help."

 

She hurriedly hands him her cell phone and jumps back into the driver’s seat. “I’ll take you to a hospital,” she says, driving maybe a little too fast, but safely. She doesn’t want to harm the poor dear in the back seat. He looks so young and so injured, like he’s about to drop dead.

 

"No. No hospital. Hotel. I can't go to a civilian hospital." he says without thinking about what he's giving away as he tries to dial Natasha's number. His fingers are slow and his vision blurry. He feels faint. But he needs to call Tasha. Tasha will save him.

 

She picks up on the first ring, with a very bitter-sounding “Who is this?”

 

“Tash,” he moans.

 

“Oh my god, Barton,” he can already hear that she’s starting to run, probably to a vehicle. “Where are you, tell me and I’ll be there.”

 

"Road. Don't know where. I'm hurt bad Tasha. They..." he chokes on his words a little, tears welling in his eyes. "They took my baby Tasha. Cut him out of me and tried to slit my wrists so I'd bleed out. I lost a lot of blood Tasha and they drugged me up something awful. Two days in and it’s still making me fuzzy.”

 

He hears her curse in Russian. “Where are you headed? I’ll meet you there.”

 

“Where are you taking me?” he asks the woman.

 

“A hotel, like you asked,” the woman says gently, even though she has every intention to bring him to a hospital once he’s passed out.

 

"Hotel." he tells Tasha. "Text you the address when we get there. You'll come get me right Nat? I need you. And don't tell Phil. I can't let him know I lost our baby, he'll hate me."

 

“He’s not going to hate you. He’s furious that the backup didn’t cover you properly, and he’s even more angry at the fact that you ignored him and went on the mission anyway, but he doesn’t hate you,” Natasha says as the sound of an engine roars to life on her end of the line. “You text me that address, swear you will.”

 

“I will,” he says tiredly. “I promise.”

 

She says nothing else as she hangs up, and the woman doesn’t ask for her phone back. Clint falls asleep within seconds.

 

When he wakes up, he’s in another cot. Panic takes him, but his body is slow to respond. He thinks he’s drugged again, the woman must have been a spy, took him back – but no. This place is much cleaner. And then he realizes that woman had lied to him, and didn’t take him to a hotel at all.

 

“You’re awake, that’s good,” a doctor says as he walks into the room with a smile. “We’re having trouble finding out who you are though; you’ve been John Doe for two days. Why don’t you tell me your name?”

 

"Can't be here." Clint says, tugging out his IVs and sitting up to climb out of bed. "Need Tasha. Need to go to Shield. Can't be here. Where are my clothes?"

 

“Whoa, hold on,” the doctor says. “You need to lie back down, or we’ll be forced to sedate you. You can’t be up an about, you’ve just undergone major surgery.”

 

"You can't do surgery without my consent." Clint barks back, getting shakily to his feet. "I can sue you and I know a guy with about a hundred very good lawyers. Now, clothes and a phone. Need to call Tasha and she'll get me to SHIELD."

 

“We didn’t perform surgery on you, someone else did,” the doctor says. “You were given to us already having gone through a massive surgery. I won’t ask you to lie down a third time, you will be sedated for your own safety. I can give you a phone to call anyone you like, but _lie down_ please.”

 

Clint glares at him but slowly climbs back into bed. "No drugs. You drug me I'll strangle you with the IV cord. Give me a phone."

 

The doctor concedes to let the man keep his IV out. “You can use my cell phone,” he says, fishing it out of his pocket and tossing it to the man. “But you’re going to need to tell me your name, for insurance reasons.”

 

"Bruce Banner. Bill Stark Industries, I'm an employee there." Clint lies, opening the phone and dialing Natasha's number again. "What hospital am I at and where?"

 

As soon as he has the information, he calls Natasha. She raves at him about how much of an idiot he is for trusting a civilian and how hard she’s going to beat him around the head, and he knows it’s all the ways she’s saying how scared she was for him without actually saying it, so he smiles and lets her get it out.

 

He tells her the address, and she swears to be there in less than twenty minutes. She’s there in eighteen, and puts the doctors through hell who try to stop her from coming to him.

 

She holds his hands and lectures him about never getting in a car with a stranger again, smacks him in the head, and kisses him full on the mouth.

 

“Phil knows,” she says after she’s done berating him. “But it wasn’t me who told him. It was Fury. You aren’t going to be happy when I tell you what I learned. I did a little digging in the last two days while you fell of the grid.”

 

"What? My baby isn't dead is he? Or she?" Clint asks, eyes wide in terror, staring up at Tasha. His heart rate monitor starts beeping as it thuds loudly against his chest and they have to shoo the doctors away who come to sedate him. "Or does Phil hate me? Is he refusing to see me?"

 

“No, nothing like that. Your baby, as far as we know, is alive. Coulson has gone himself to retrieve the child. Fury allowed you to be a part of the mission with the intention that your baby would be taken. He had a SHIELD agent undercover in the operation, and he planted a tracking chip in your baby’s arm. Fury wanted to know where the children were being taken and why. I’ve never seen Coulson more furious in my life. I think even Fury was scared of him when he told Coulson what was going on. Told Fury at gunpoint to tell him where to find his baby. He’s headed there right now, the kids were taken – or at least yours – was taken to Canada.” Natasha says, rubbing at a scab on the back of Clint’s hand.

 

"They....wanted to take my baby? They were just going to let them take my baby and leave me for dead?" Clint asks, going pale. "Fuck. Fuck them, all of them, once you get me out of this hospital I'm going to give Fury a piece of my mind, the asshole. What if they'd killed my baby? What then? Did he even consider that?"

 

“He said he considered all the possibilities, but that ultimately it was more important to know where the babies were being taken, and to stop them, than to take extra measures to save yours. The same agent who planted the chip in your baby also slit your wrists much more shallowly than the rest of the omegas so you could escape. I assume Fury intends to reunite you with your child.” She reaches into her jacket pocket and pulls out a bluetooth headset. “This is a direct line to Coulson. Do you want to talk to him?”

 

Clint looks down at his hands. Of course he wants to talk to Coulson but he doesn't think he can stand all that anger and disappointment.  
  
"He probably doesn't have time." he says as his excuse. "He's trying to find his son or daughter. I'll see him when he gets back."

 

“He wants to talk to you,” she says, putting the headset in Clint’s lap. “I would call him. I think he’d like to hear your voice. I’m going to go find out if the doctor has the right insurance information, _Bruce_.” She smiles at him as she leaves the room.

 

Clint fiddles with the headset before finally giving in and turning it on.  
  
"If this is Phil and you can hear me, I'm sorry." he says as soon as the other line picks up.

 

“Thank god you’re alive,” is the first thing Phil says. “When I heard you’d called Natasha, and then you disappeared again in the back of a stranger’s car I just about had a conniption.”

 

"She said she'd take me to a hotel." Clint groans. "Lying bitch. I'm so sorry Phil. If you hate me forever I get it, I really do. Once you find our baby you don't have to come back, that's okay."

 

“How could I possibly hate you?” Phil says, a little too aggressively.

 

Clint winces. "I volunteered and got our baby kidnapped. I could have gotten him or her killed."

 

“Sure, I’m not happy about that, but you’re going to make it up to me by being the best damn mother to our child you can possibly be,” Phil growls. He’s on a very long and boring train ride, presently, and he’s been irritated and terrified for hours. He’s finally starting to relax a little at the sound of Clint’s voice.

 

"I don't deserve it. I don't deserve to even see him." Clint says sadly. "I could have gotten him killed. If he's hurt or sick that's my fault. And Fury's but he'll pay for that."

 

“This whole thing is Fury’s fault. If he hadn’t lied to you and told you that you’d be safe, that you’d have backup, you wouldn’t have gone along with it. I know you wouldn’t have. Because you’re going to be a fantastic parent, and you love that child fiercely. There’s nothing I could possibly say to you that you haven’t already thought of, because no one will ever make you feel guiltier about it than you have already made yourself. And that’s okay – that’s normal. If you weren’t feeling guilty, I really wouldn’t bring the baby home. But you feel guilt because you love our child, and you’re going to love it just as fiercely when I bring it home and you hold him or her for the first time.”

 

"I love you Phil. I don't deserve you or this baby but I love you both so much." he gasps between sobs. "I just wanted to be a good husband for you and a good mother for him and I've already screwed it up. Fuck Phil, you and him deserve so much better."

 

“You’re perfect for us,” Phil says gently. “I wouldn’t want anyone else in the whole world.”

 

"The sad thing is you really mean that." Clint chuckles through his tears. "Please bring him home Phil. I want to hold my baby."

 

“Or her,” Phil reminds gently. “We don’t technically know yet.”

 

"Because I didn't get to give birth to them." Clint whispers, suddenly feeling very cold and empty. He'd been so excited when he found out he was finally pregnant that the whole process, even the painful messy parts, seemed exciting. And now they've missed the most important moment, welcoming their child into the world, and they'll never get that back. That thought alone makes him feel small and sick and so alone.

 

“God, Clint,” Phil whispers, wishing desperately that he could wrap his arms around his omega. “It’s going to be okay. I will make it okay. I will massacre every poor soul that gets in my way, and I will rescue those children. I will bring our baby home.”

 

They talk for a little while, going over the names they’d narrowed down to again, and who they think the babe will look like, until Phil’s stop comes. He gives Clint a gentle goodbye, and a promise to call him again as soon as possible.

 

Clint is a nervous wreck for an hour and a half before the headset rings, and he lifts it instantly.

 

“I’m nearing the military base they’re keeping the children on. It’s Hydra. I didn’t know they had stations in Canada,” Phil says, his voice somewhat hushed. “I’m sneaking in on a weapons manifest. It shouldn’t take me too long to find the children.”

 

"Please be safe Phil. Don't take unnecessary risks. You can't bring our baby home if you're dead." Clint begs, clutching the phone so tight his hand starts to hurt. "Promise me you'll come home too."

 

“I’ll sooner kill every man and woman on this base then let them stand in the way of me handing our baby to you, and seeing that first smile on your face when you look down at him. Or her,” Phil says. “Wait, shh. Don’t make a sound, they’re doing a check.”

 

He ducks behind a crate and presses himself beneath the cloth flap as two people come on and do a quick once-over. Thankful for the fact he’s wearing camouflage and not a suit, Phil breathes again only when the canvas cover falls back over the truck and the cargo area darkens.

 

“Okay, they didn’t see me,” he whispers and looks out the plastic window to see where they are now. “I’m inside. Just have to wait till the right moment to jump out. I’m in Hydra uniform, so I should blend in.”

 

"Just be careful. I want you all in one piece when you bring me our baby." Clint says, falling back on his pillows, his heart starting to beat again.

 

Phil knows Clint knows when to be quiet – when all he can hear is the sound of Phil’s breathing. He talks Clint through when he jumps out of the back of the truck and steps right into line with a slew of other Hydra soldiers. He gets berated for not wearing his helmet right, so he slips the visor down.

 

“This is way too easy,” Phil says cautiously as he breaks formation and slips down a hall. The chip in their baby’s skin is still working, and he uses a small device to maneuver through the halls towards the soundless blip.

 

“I’m also going to find out _why_ they’re taking children while I’m here,” he tells the omega. “So that we can stop them for good and all.”

 

"You have backup right?" Clint asks, the idea that he might not suddenly dawning on the younger man. Fury lied and sent him in without back up and he could have done the same to Phil.

 

“Not exactly,” Phil says hesitantly. “Fury didn’t want me coming here at all. I’m here against his wishes. He was going to let Hydra do its thing for a while with the children and _eventually_ rescue them. He wants to know for sure what they’re doing with the kids, by studying the affected kids directly. I prefer to rescue the children unharmed, and find the _plans_ for what they were going to do.”

 

"He was going to let them use our baby as an experiment!" Clint says, jumping out of the bed. "That's it, he's dead. I'm leaving the hospital now to kill him. I'll probably die on the way out so I want to say I love you and please don't tell our son or daughter about this."

 

“You leave that hospital I will see to it that your range privileges are taken away _for a year_ ,” Phil says seriously.

 

"You can't do that because I'm going to quit. I can't work for him, Phil, and when I tell Tasha and the others they'll quit too." Clint says ruefully, searching through the room for pants and a shirt. He doesn't even care about underwear he just needs something other than a hospital gown.

 

“You _lie down in that bed right now_ ,” Phil suddenly says, his voice dark and sharp, and Clint flinches. Phil doesn’t use his alpha advantage often, because he knows how much Clint hates it, but he can deal with a little disdain right now if it’ll keep Clint safe in a hospital where people can make sure his stitches don’t pop and his insides don’t fall out.

 

"I'm losing my mind in here Phil." Clint complains, sitting down on the edge of the bed. "You're off rescuing our baby who could be being used for terrible experiments while I'm stuck in a hospital having to imagine it all but doing nothing all the while knowing you and he wouldn't be there if it wasn't for me and Fury. I have to do something before I start tearing my hair out or get my hands on a scalpel and do something really bad."

 

“You and I will go to Fury once the children are rescued _together_ and make a formal complaint. You _will not_ leave that hospital, no matter how badly you think you’re going to lose your mind, because like it or not you are badly injured, and those stitches are the only things stopping your insides from becoming outsides,” Phil says sternly.

 

"I don't want to lodge a complaint I want to lodge a bullet in his skull, pack up my stuff and head back to Ohio where you found me. With you and our son right behind me." Clint complains. "Fuck  Phil, what if you're too late? What if Fury told you too late and our son is gone or isn't our child anymore? What if he's not human anymore? What if we can't have him or her back?" Clint asks, the tears starting again. "I'll kill myself Phil. You know I will."

 

“Don’t make wild assumptions,” Phil says gently. “Until we find out otherwise, let’s keep anticipating a beautiful baby boy or girl just waiting to be brought home and be loved by us.”

 

"They could have broke me Phil." Clint whispers. "They could have taken our child and left me unable to have another. I might have ruined our only chance at having a family."

 

Phil swallows hard and leans up against a wall with a sigh. “No, it’s… it’s not just you. I… there’s something I haven’t told you about… about that last visit to the doctor’s I had. I lied to you.”

 

"What?" Clint says, blinking back tears. Phil doesn't lie. Phil promised he would never lie to him again. "You told me you'd always tell me the truth. You said I could trust you."

 

“You were already talking about wanting a second child, I couldn’t – ” Phil swallows back tears of his own, refuses to show weakness. “Whatever it was Castle injected me with, back when she kidnapped you, it… killed whatever it is inside me that allows me to produce children. I – I can’t give you any more children, even if you were able to have a thousand. _I’m_ broken, Clint. I can’t give you a big family.”

 

"You...you didn't tell me." Clint whispers, pulling his feet up onto the bed and hugging his knees. "You're supposed to tell me everything. I tell you everything. How could you keep this from me Phil?"

 

“Because I couldn’t stand the thought of you being disappointed in me,” Phil says bitterly. “Because I know you want a whole litter, and I can’t give that to you – I can’t ever give that to you, even if you were the most fertile omega in all the planet, I can’t ever give you another child.”

 

"So you were just going to let me think it was my fault?" Clint yells into the phone. "Just let the years of trying go by with me thinking it's my fault? You were just going to let me suffer thinking I couldn't give you another child? Did you ever think of what that would do to me Phil?"

 

“No, that’s not what I was going to do,” Phil hisses, glad he’s not able to safely raise his voice so he doesn’t seem confrontational. “I was going to hope that you wouldn’t want another child as soon as you had the one. And if the time came that you say you want to honestly try for a second, I would have told you. I’m not that _heartless_ , Clint.”

 

"No, you're just a liar. A liar and a sneak and a fucking bastard just like Fury. Is that what you guys do? You get together and figure out how to best crush people's hearts? Fuck, I trusted you Phil. And you were just hoping my entire plan for our future would suddenly change instead of fucking talking to me?" Clint yells, hands clenching into tight fists. He stands up again and starts looking for his clothes once more. "I'm going to Tasha's place. Call me when you find our only child if he's still alive."

 

“Clint, don’t you dare make this entirely my fault,” Phil snaps, ducking into a room so he can talk a little louder. “You have been talking for _YEARS_ about how terrified you’ve been that I would leave you because you couldn’t give me children, and I told you how much I loved you and I didn’t care, and it didn’t matter - and now that I have those same fears you’re just calling me a sneak and you’re going to run away? What the hell kind of a husband does that make you?”

 

"I _TOLD_ YOU!" Clint screams, falling to the floor. "I _ALWAYS_ TOLD YOU! I NEVER LIED, I TOLD YOU I MIGHT NOT BE ABLE TO HAVE CHILDREN AND IF YOU HAD TOLD ME I WOULD HAVE BEEN OKAY WITH IT! I WOULD HAVE TOLD YOU I LOVE YOU ANYWAY AND WE HAVE ONE AND THAT'S MORE THAN ENOUGH BUT YOU FUCKING LIED!"

 

“You’re not the only one with insecurities, Clint,” Phil says bitterly. “Just because I’m less vocal about  mine doesn’t mean I’m a bad person. And to be fair, I never told you I could have any more children, I just told you I was _fine_. And I _am_. I’m healthy, despite the fact I’m sterile.”

 

"You let me hope though. You let me sit there, happily imagining us with three or four kids in a big house somewhere. The big happy family I never had but you knew I wanted and you never told me it wasn't going to happen." Clint says coldly. He looks down to see blood on his hospital gown. "And I pulled a stitch because of you, you asshole."

 

“I _told_ you to lie down,” Phil growls. “Do _not_ blame your injuries on me. I am out here risking my _neck_ for your baby and all you want to do is go cry to Natasha because I had the _nerve_ to let you hold onto _hope_ for a couple years!

 

"You shouldn't. Never let someone hope when you're just going to tear it away." Clint replies, still lying on the floor. He knows he should call a doctor but he doesn't want to. Not yet. "And he's our baby Phil. _Our_ baby, unless you don't want him anymore."

 

“I don’t want him if I can’t have you with him, and your trust issues are so fragile as it is that I’m having a hard time believing you even want me home,” Phil snaps. “Unless you tell me otherwise I’ll bring your baby home and let you keep it, but I refuse to be target practice for Natasha, who thinks she can be a better alpha for you even if she’s a beta.”

 

"Of course I want you Phil. You were all I ever wanted, whether or not I could give you a baby or you could give me one." Clint whispers. "I don't like being lied to. I don't want false hope or happy lies. I want you to love me and want to tell me things so we can get through them together because that's what you told me we would have when we started this relationship."

 

“I wasn’t ever going to lie to you,” Phil says, voice low and cold and hurt. “If you ever wanted to have another kid I was going to tell you, but there’s no crime in letting you be happy. You’re the only one who would prefer to be miserable the whole time than happy half the time. I don’t understand why you always assume the worst from me.”

 

"Letting me hope was a lie. I had a plan and you never told me it was impossible. You let me think it was what you wanted and that that was what we could have and that is a lie." Clint replies even more softly. "I don't assume the worst Phil. Not with you. I would have been sad when you told me but I would have gotten over it and been happy again but you didn't tell me." He stops and looks down to see the blood stain getting bigger. "Might have been more than one stitch."

 

Phil feels sick. “You get that checked out. I have babies to save.”

 

He says nothing else, and hangs up the receiver. He slides down the wall and allows himself a few secret moments to cry.

 

He never wanted to hurt Clint. He hates himself, hates Castle even more, and some little part of him hates Clint for not being understanding of the reasons he was afraid to tell. When an omega can’t have children, he or she is pitied, and they are able to adopt – because omegas are supposed to rear children, that’s their whole purpose in life. They will end up with a child one way or the other.

 

But if an alpha can’t have children, he or she is just plumb out of luck. There’s no pity for a sterile alpha, because they’re not meant to _have_ children, only to make them. His fear and his insecurities got the better of him because god dammit he’s human.

 

Clint lays on the floor crying until a nurse comes and has the doctors take him in to fix his stitches. He doesn't fight them when they hook him up to an IV this time. His world starts going black as the drugs enter his system and the last thing he remembers is crying out for Phil before everything goes dark.


	2. Chapter 2

He wakes up once, briefly, (or at least he thinks he wakes up?) only for Natasha to hold his hand and tell him that Phil was shot and killed in his attempt to save the children. He fell back into unconsciousness only seconds later, but when he opens his eyes and the windows are dark and hours have passed, it feels like it was only a split second ago. Natasha isn’t in the room anymore, and he can’t tell if she was ever there or not, but he remembers the words.

 

“ _Phil didn’t make it. He was found in the room with the children and he was gunned down._ ”

 

He scrambles for the phone at his bedside, heart racing too fast, the drugs only fuelling his panic as he punches in the number for Phil's com into the headset with shaking hands. He needs to know. He needs to hear Phil's voice or hear the call fail. He has to know because if he's lost Phil he'll rip out everyone of his stitches and bleed out here and now. Because his life is nothing without Phil, with or without the child.

 

He gets a whispered answer after the first ring, and it’s Phil’s voice.

 

“ _I’m kind of in the middle of something, Clint, what do you need?_ ”

 

"I love you." He says in a rush, letting out a sigh of relief. Tears of joy start forming in his eyes and he struggles to blink them back. "I was mad before but I'm not now. I overreacted because I have trust issues, you're right. I didn't even consider how this might be for you and if you wanted a big family too and I'm sorry and I love you. Without you I would die. You're all I need even if you're a fucking lying asshole because you're not always so just fucking know I love you and I need you to come home."

 

Phil is floored by the confession, and he stops dead in the deserted hallway he’d been creeping down. He blinks in shock, trying to think of something to say in return.

 

“I – I love you too,” he babbles stupidly. “Uh, did you – did you get your stitches fixed?”

 

"I don't know. I don't care. They hooked me up to something and Tasha told me you were dead but you're not." Clint laughs. "And I just had to be sure and tell you I love you."

 

“Natasha told you I’m dead? Why would she tell you that?” Phil says as he starts down the hallway again.

 

"I might have imagined it. I was only awake for a second and she was hazy." Clint says. "Are you close? Have you found them?"

 

“I’m incredibly close,” Phil says. “I was getting ready to call you back, but I was going to wait until I was in the room. The chip in the baby’s skin is working perfectly, but I don’t have a blueprint of the base so I’ve been flying blind, with that blip as my only indication that I’m going in the right direction. I started on the very bottom floor and started working my way up. I’ve  been standing right on top of the blip three times now, and this is the top floor – so unless there’s a basement I’ve overlooked, I should be nearing the children very soon.”

 

"Be careful." Clint says again, remembering his hallucination. "Please. And Phil, I really don't care if we can't have more kids. I'll have more than I ever deserved with you and one beautiful child."

 

“We can try for adoption in a few years if we want another one,” Phil says, even though he knows it’s pretty much hopeless, given their professions. “Or, you know, I could just bring a second baby home. All the other omegas are dead, you’re the only one that survived.”

 

"No. We should find their fathers. Most of them are probably emotional wrecks and they should at least have their children back." Clint replies. "And we both know we can't adopt. Even if an adoption agency was crazy enough to let us Fury would stop it."

 

Phil laughs a little. “I think Fury’s jealous because he’s a beta,” he says, not even caring that he’s let slip the biggest personal secret Fury has always tried to keep. He doesn’t give a shit, considering their current situation and what Fury was going to let happen to his omega and his child.

 

"I knew it. He always smelled off somehow. Tasha will feel better now. She hates being the only beta." Clint says with a small smile.

 

“I might not be the only one with that piece of information, but considering the situation he’s put us both in, he’ll know it came from me,” Phil sighed. “Nobody’s supposed to know. I could get in big trouble if you tell anyone. If you can make sure that Natasha won’t tell a soul then you can tell her, but if she’ll spill then we need to keep it our little secret that we can giggle about when Fury’s looking the other direction.”

 

"I really don't give a damn about Fury's feelings right now. I'm ready to text it to Tony." Clint admits, looking down at his slashed wrists. "He had me captured, my baby cut out of me and then left me for dead while my baby was taken away to be experimented on without any hope of rescue. He deserves every piece of grief I can pile on him."

 

Phil gives a wry chuckle. “It’s not his feelings I’m worried about, it’s – ”

 

He cuts off into dead silence, but Clint can still hear him breathing.

 

“My god. I see them,” Phil says. “I can see them, there’s five of them all in a row. Oh my god, Clint, our baby is in that room.”

 

"How will you know which one is ours?" Clint asks, suddenly terrified. “What if you bring home the wrong baby? What if it’s not our son?”

 

“Um. Tracking chip?” Phil says as he heads to the door, after looking through the large window for a few seconds.

 

"Right. Sorry." Clint says, feeling like an idiot. "Drugs make me stupider. Told em not to give me any. Doctors never listen."

 

“It’s okay, you just don’t have to worry,” Phil says, licking his lips as he inspects the door. “There’s some kind of a code that needs to be punched in to get inside. It’s currently seven PM, most people have already turned in for the night, but I still run the risk of being caught if I just stand here hitting random buttons. There’s also the possibility that a certain number of mis-entered codes will sound an alarm, or even a silent alarm, that will lock me out and alert the authorities here. Or, I could just break my way through the window, gather up as many kids as I can carry, and run as fast as I can.”

 

"You got anything powdery?" Clint asks.

 

“Powdery? Sure, let me just pull out my compact and make sure my nose isn’t shiny,” Phil says with a little edge of dry humor to his voice.

 

“If you can find something like baby powder you can use it to find fingerprints and get the code." Clint replies tiredly.

 

“Even if I could phase through the door and get the baby powder inside and then phase back out to use the powder, all it would give me are the numbers, not the code,” Phil says.

 

"Well I'm out of ideas. If you just go in and grab the kids whatever ones you don't get they'll probably kill because their experiments have been compromised." Clint says sadly. "So what are you going to do?"

 

“I… I am going to bullshit my way into that room. I need to find out who is working on the project, what they are wearing, and what questions to ask to get inside and get the children out. I might be here more than one day,” Phil sighs.

 

"Just save our baby and as many of the others as you can." Clint says. "I love you."


	3. Chapter 3

Phil is careful. Incredibly careful. He’s certain never to talk to anyone more than once, and he always uses the same fake name so people don’t get confused and suspicious. It only takes a few hours for him to track down someone who works with the babies, and he kills them as quickly and painlessly as possible. He takes their uniform and ID card, and finds a closet to stay in for the night.

 

Bright and early, he goes to the children the next day, telling the supervisor that he’s been relocated into the project for the day. And he almost gets away with it, but the supervisor sees the name and picture on the card he got into the room with. Phil kills him before he can sound an alarm.

 

There are no cameras in the room with the babies, which is strange, but he decides not to question it. He looks at the five children with anticipation, and takes out the tracking device to finally find out which is his child – but then he stops, because this is the closest he’ll ever come to sharing the first moment with his child with Clint.

 

With a quick dial, he waits for Clint to pick up.

 

Clint picks up on the second ring, still groggy after another round of drugs while the doctors tried to right any damage done to his system.  
  
"Phil?" he croaks. "Is something wrong?"

 

“I just, uhh,” Phil swallows. “I’m in the room, and I’m looking across at the babies, and I don’t know which one is ours yet because I haven’t approached and – well – I thought maybe you might want me to describe him or her as soon as I see it.”

 

Clint's heart clenches. Phil is about to see their baby for the first time and he isn't there. Its not even on their baby's birthday. Which, he realizes, he doesn't know.  
  
"Yeah. Yeah I'd like that." he chokes out, taking a few deep breaths. "Fuck I hate Fury, have I mentioned that?"

 

“I think you might have,” Phil says as he looks down at the tracker and follows the blip slowly to the second baby on the right. He swallows and looks up from the screen into the little metal crib, and his heart melts. “Oh,” he says softly, and sets the tracker down on the table beside the crib. “Oh, Clint, it’s – I actually don’t know the gender, they’re all wrapped up in white blankets, hold on.”

 

There’s a little fussing, the sound of rustling cloth and the whine of a baby being woken, but it doesn’t cry.

 

“Clint, you’ve been right all along. We have a son,” Phil says breathlessly as he looks down at the fussy baby.

 

Clint feels tears on his cheeks and in a moment of anger pulls his IV from his arm to throw the stand across the room. They have a son. He has a son, a little baby boy who will be nearly a month old the first time he even gets to hold him.  
  
"What's he look like? Does he look healthy? Is he normal?" he asks breathlessly.

 

“He’s – he’s got my blue eyes,” Phil says, proud of his ability to keep from choking up. “And he’s got blonde hair like you, but it’s light – really light. Almost white, it’s so light.”

 

"Is he healthy? Does he weigh enough? Is he big enough?" Clint asks, wishing he were there to see this.

 

“He looks perfect,” Phil says. “Of course we’ll get him a full check up, but on the outside he looks healthy and normal. He’s a little bit on the small side, but you were still three weeks before your due date.”

 

"He'll always be small, won't he?" Clint presses. "He'll always be too small because I agreed to this damn mission and Fury was a dick who decided to gamble with our child's life. Is he beautiful Phil? Tell me he's beautiful."

 

“He’s gorgeous,” Phil breathes. “But just because he’s born small doesn’t mean he’ll always be small. Three weeks premature isn’t much at all, and chances are he’ll grow perfectly normally. Especially if we give him a proper diet.”

 

"I haven't been able to feed him." Clint groans. "He's been on formula. Switching him off it will make him sick."

 

“We will make it work, I swear,” Phil says as he lifts the child and re-works the blanket into a sling. He loops it over his shoulder and cradles the baby into his side. He turns to start looking for some kind of wheeled cart in hopes that he could walk the children out, but he freezes at the sight of the open door.

 

“Impossible – ” is the last thing Clint hears, along with a gunshot, before the line goes dead.

 

"No!" Clint screams into the headset, his heart beating so hard it physically hurts. "Phil! Phil answer me! ANSWER ME GODDAMMIT!"

 

The nurses rush in when his alarms start blaring, and it takes two doctors and a nurse to restrain him and sedate him, and they set to work to make sure his stitches didn’t pop again.

 

==

 

With the child on his hip and a bullet in his chest, Phil ducks behind the counter with a groan. His headset fell to the ground with a crack when he doubled back with the force of the gunshot, and the green light had turned red – his call had been dropped. He wants to grab it and call Clint back, since the last thing he must have heard was the gun going off, but he can’t risk sticking any part of him out. 

 

“I guess I didn’t do a very good job at shooting you to death, did I Castle?” he groans at the woman in the doorway, pressing the heel of one hand into the wound, and cocking his own gun with the other.

 

"I'm very resilient." the woman replies with a cruel smile. "Now, why don't you put that baby back where he belongs and come out so I don't have to kill you both."

 

“Why are you collecting babies? What exactly are you trying to accomplish here?” Phil asks, trying to buy time as he loudly prepares his gun for a shoot-off, so she knows he has one.

 

"That's classified. Well above your pay grade, you understand don't you Agent Coulson?" Castle laughs, picking up on of the nearby babies to hold against her chest while keeping her gun trained on his hiding place. "Careful now Coulson. I have no end of shields to use. And luckily for me I'm not burdened by the same moral qualms you have."

 

Phil feels nauseous as he weighs his options. He could shoot her in the knee, but chances are she’d shoot the baby just to be spiteful. He could try to be quick enough to get her in the knee and then the head, but he’s not as good of a shot as Clint is, even if Clint is better with arrows.

 

He could shoot her through the baby. It would certainly take her by surprise, and it isn’t _his_ baby. His is right by his side. But somewhere out there, there’s an alpha who is missing their omega _and_ child and damn her, Castle is right. Phil doesn’t want to put that grief on anyone. Not when he experienced it himself after believing Clint to be gone.

 

Luckily for him, Castle is a vengeful bitch. She never got over the fact that Phil wouldn’t be her handler because of her reckless attitude and disregard for human life. She proved that when she kidnapped Clint when he was only five months pregnant with the intention of ransoming him, and then eventually decided she would keep him and turn him into a breeder. Last he saw of her she was bleeding out on the ground from his bullet, but he made the mistake of walking away before he was completely sure she was dead. He definitely won’t make that mistake twice.

 

And because she’s a vengeful bitch, that means she hasn’t called security. Because they would come and want him arrested and questioned, and she wants to kill him for reporting her out of control rule-breaking and getting her fired from SHIELD.

 

“Not my baby,” he finally says, trying to throw her off. “You’d be surprised what I’ll do to protect my own.”

 

"Oh I doubt that." she laughs. "But if you don't care, I suppose this doesn't bother you."  
  
She holds the baby by its blanket and lowers the infant to the floor, letting it drop the last half a foot so the infant begins to cry, loud angry wails filling the room. Then they abruptly stop, cut short and reduced to pained gurgles as she steps on its weak chest.  
  
"You going to let it die Coulson? Or are you going to come out and try to be a hero like you always do?" she calls.

 

“Don’t kill it!” Coulson roars, and steps up from behind the counter, but he keeps his baby shielded as he fires several bullets recklessly in her direction. She raises her gun and he catches another bullet in the shoulder before he watches her slump back against the door with a gunshot wound to the head. The baby is shrieking as Castle trails blood on the door, sliding down to the floor. He scoops the baby up quickly and tries to shush it, but chances are it has a broken rib or two.

 

“It’ll be okay,” he says gently, rocking the child until it finally stops crying. He slings it to his chest, both to keep it protected and to put pressure on his gun wound. With no way to transport the babies on wheels, he has no choice but to sling every one to him. He puts one on his other side, opposite his own child, and one on his back, which leaves one lying in its crib.

 

At a loss for what to do, he just picks the infant up and holds it in one hand. Quick as he can, he uses his free hand to download every scrap of data he can find on the computers in the room onto a flash drive he brought with him, and then wipes the computers clean. They probably have backups, but pardon him for feeling spiteful.

 

He picks the headset back up and calls Clint three times, but gets no answer. Chances are he freaked out and tried to escape the hospital when he heard the gun go off, and he’s sedated by doctors. Which means he’s safe, which is one less thing Phil has to worry about right now. He focuses his energy on sneaking back through the halls with five babies and two bullets in his gun.

 

 

 

 

Clint wakes up in a different room, soft cuffs holding his arms to the bed. His head is fuzzy but he remembers breaking at least one doctor's nose and incapacitating two security guards before they managed to drug him into unconsciousness.   
  
He struggles against his bonds until soft hands touch his arms, soothing him into stillness. He looks up at Tasha who gives him a little smile.  
  
"He's alive Clint." she tells him. "He was injured but he's alive and so is your baby. He'll come to see you soon but your son is still under observation."  
  
"For how much longer?" he demands.  
  
His heart sinks when she looks away. "We don't know. They're running tests."

 

She keeps him company for the next hour before Clint’s head shoots up to the door and he goes silent in the middle of a sentence, and Tasha knows without looking that Phil is in the doorway. She gives him a polite nod before ducking out of the door past him. Phil has his arm in a sling and a cut on his face, but he looks otherwise well and back in a suit like he belongs. He closes the door behind him before sitting on the side of the bed and peppering Clint’s teary face with kisses.

 

“It was Castle,” he says, smoothing his free hand over Clint’s hair. “I didn’t kill her the last time I shot her. She’s dead now, she’s dead, I made sure.”

 

"I don't care. You're home. I thought you were dead. I was going to come avenge you. But they stopped me." Clint says, wishing his arms were free so he could hold Phil against him and really feel him there to make sure it isn't a dream.

 

“I avenged myself,” Coulson laughs weakly. “Does that make me an honorary Avenger?”

 

"You were always an Avenger." Clint laughs. "Will you untie me? I promise I won't hurt myself. I just want to be able to hold you while I cry."

 

Phil struggles to undo the buckles with one hand, but Clint helps him with the second one before he’s upright and clinging to Phil like they’re both about to die.

 

“I’m here,” Phil whispers, holding the trembling omega tightly with his good arm and pressing kisses into his neck and shoulder.

 

"I love you," Clint whispers, probably a hundred times between kisses and long breaths where he inhales Phil's familiar scent. "I love you, I love you."

 

“We have a baby,” Phil reminds him. “A boy. We need to name him. You remember the names we were thinking of for a boy?”

 

"Joseph, after your father. Adam, Gale, Dean, Matthew, Sean and Justin." Clint recites, counting them off in his head. "I said no to Steve."

 

“Joseph was my father’s fake name,” Phil laughs. “I don’t even know his real name. I think he forgot it, too.”

 

"I like Matthew." Clint says. "But I don't want to make a decision until I see him. Why can't I see him Phil? Is something wrong with him?"

 

“They’re taking blood and tissue samples,” Phil says. “They have to make sure he’s not – they have to make sure he’s fine. And they’re removing the tracking chip.”

 

"Good. So he'll be free soon?" Clint asks, close to begging. "I need to hold my baby Phil. I need to see him and have him in my arms. I've already missed so much."

 

“You haven’t missed that much,” Phil says as he rubs Clint’s back. “You’ll still be there for first words, first steps, first dates, graduating high school, his wedding, you’ll be there for all his life. What’s a few days in the grand scheme of things?”  

 

"A few days? They aren't just a few days, they're his first days. The days when he came into this world and became part of our family. The day he was born Phil! And I missed it. It's supposed to be magical and wonderful and I missed it."

 

“Just because you were kidnapped for that experience doesn’t mean that the entire experience of raising him won’t be magical,” Phil says gently.

 

Clint shakes his head. "No but there's that moment right? The moment when he's born and he's tiny and red and can't even open his eyes all the way and I'm tired and sweaty and I hold him for the first time and you're there and we all become a family, right? That's how it’s supposed to go when you have a baby. And we don't have that."

 

 “So?” Phil challenges. “We’re not exactly an average pair, Clint.”

 

"No. But I wanted something to be normal." Clint says sadly. "I wanted to hold my baby when he was born. Not after he's had a month to grow and change."

 

“It hasn’t been a month,” Phil says. “Um, has it? I actually haven’t been keeping track of time all that well.”

 

"I don't know. Its been weeks. I don't even know his birthday Phil. We missed his birthday." Clint sighs, leaning against Phil. "And by the time Fury gives him back to us we might miss another."

 

“Fury doesn’t have any say in the matter. Our son is being tested in this very hospital, I’m not about to hand my – our – baby over to _another_ glorified boys-only club with too many toys to play with and not enough brain cells. Wow. Don’t know how many years I’ve been waiting to let that one out.”

 

Clint laughs and gives him another kiss. "I don't want Fury anywhere near him. Possibly ever. I don't know if I'm going back. I don't think I'll ever forgive him." He pauses and looks down as if afraid of what he's about to say. "He didn't mean for us to get him back, did he? Fury didn't want us to have a baby."

 

“Of course Fury didn’t want us to have a baby. But I have one hell of a bargaining chip,” Phil says as he reaches into his shirt pocket and produces a flash drive.

 

"That the information from the Hydra base?" Clint asks.

 

“It is indeed. And I have had a chance to look over it. It’s not a big surprise they were trying ­ _again_ to make another Captain Nazi like Rogers, but they were trying it with localized _microwaves_ this time. They were going to try to cook the insides of the babies in just such a way that it kick-drives their immune systems into over-drive. Kind of like overclocking a computer, only minus the circuitry and raising one nervous system.”

 

"Oh god." Clint says, curling up against Phil a little more. "They could have killed them. They might have done permanent damage. What if they hurt our baby Phil? Fucking hell."

 

“I don’t they even started testing yet,” Phil soothes. “There would be signs – his mouth would be a darker shade of red and the insides of his ears would be bloodshot. I told you, he looks very healthy. We should be able to see him within a couple hours.”

 

"I just want to hold my baby." Clint mutters, letting Phil smooth his unbrushed hair. "I want to hold him and give him a name and be able to look at him and see both of us looking back."

 

 

They hold each other for two and a half hours, talking about all the little ways they could  get back at Fury, all the little nasty pranks they could pull – with Coulson’s full and willing cooperation – before their conversation is cut short by a middle-aged blonde doctor standing in the doorway with a little blue bundle.

 

“He checked out perfectly normal,” the doctor says, flashing the couple a toothy smile. “Would you like to hold him?”

 

“Clint?” Phil gestures to the man holding their child.

 

"If you don't give me my baby I will kill you." Clint replies, his face blank and tone cold. The doctor's small falters and he hesitantly steps closer to hand over the child, staying as far away as he can without dropping the infant.  
  
Clint practically snatches the child away, but is careful to support his head and small body.  
  
Phil was right. He is beautiful. The most beautiful thing Clint has ever seen. He's not tiny and wrinkled and red like he should be the first time a mother holds their baby but he's still beautiful, sleeping peacefully in Clint's arms.  
  
"I'm never gonna lose you again." Clint promises, tears dripping onto his son's blankets. "I swear, no one is ever going to take you away from me. I won't miss anything. I'll be perfect for you, I promise. I know I'm a mess and I'm stupid but I'll figure it out. And I'll love you more than you could ever want."

 

The baby opens his big blue eyes and blinks right up at Clint. He burbles a little, blows a spit bubble, and yawns. Clint doesn’t even realize the doctor left, doesn’t hear Phil encouraging him to decide on a name, all he can do is stare down at the wriggly little blonde with reverence in his eyes.

 

He holds out a finger, gently touching his son's soft, tiny fingers. The baby instinctively closes his fist around the calloused digit and the dam inside Clint breaks. He holds the baby tight and starts to sob, happiness and fear and soul-crushing guilt all coming out in loud, harsh sobs into the baby's blanket while his son holds onto his finger.

 

Phil lets Clint cry it out, gently rubbing his hair and his back when Clint isn’t rocking. He knows Clint has a lot to get out, and it would be disastrous to his mental health to force him to bottle it in.

 

Thirty minutes and one massive headache later, and Phil is helping Clint lie back on his pillows. He rearranges their son on Clint’s chest to face him and shimmies up onto the small cot on his side so he can look down at the baby’s face.

 

“What do you want to name him?” he asks, rubbing his thumb gently over the baby’s forehead.

 

"I like Matthew still. I think Matthew will be good for him." Clint says finally, looking down at their son. "What about you? He's your son too."

 

“I like Matthew, too,” Phil agrees, kissing the tired omega’s forehead. “Matthew Coulson. It’s perfect. He’s perfect. You’re perfect. And Fury is going to make sure we’re set for life if he wants this data. I don’t give a shit if it’s bribing. He can shove his rules up his butt.”

 

They fill out the paperwork right then, officially naming their son Matthew Coulson. The other Avengers are allowed to visit within the week and when they hear the story they agree that if Clint wants to leave SHIELD they'll be with him.   
  
He leaves the hospital still angry and ready to leave SHIELD for good but decides against it. For better or worse Phil will never leave the job and he would rather be by his side than at home worrying. Fury gives him a year of maternity leave that he takes along with a significant pay raise without ever speaking to the man. It takes even longer than that for him to agree to be in the same room as him and he never takes Matthew to any SHIELD offices, too terrified that he'll look away for a second and never see his son again.

 

He vows that with every breath in his body he will protect Matthew. The only thing he’s ever put into the world to replace everything he’s taken out.


End file.
